Mark Patterson advances undersea monitoring

Understanding, predicting, and ultimately mitigating the impact of climate change on our urban coastlines requires close, continuous monitoring of earth’s oceans, as well as its atmosphere.

But manned diving expeditions are expensive and limited in the amount of ocean area they can cover. To overcome those constraints, Patterson has developed a line of autonomous, underwater robots known as Fetches.

Equipped with GPS, cameras, and various types of sensors, Fetch bots can collect vast amounts of data over time about water movement and the ocean floor, marine life populations, the condition of coral reefs, and oxygen levels.

“The robot is thinking for itself, executing its mission, dealing with unforeseen circumstances, trying to preserve itself, and reacting to things it sees in the coastal zone,” says Patterson.

By deploying a small army of Fetch bots, scientists gain a more accurate picture of how and where the ocean is changing, and the impact of oceanic change on our climate and coastlines.

CAMD/CEE Assistant Professor David Fannon is working with Michelle Laboy and Peter Wiederspahn from the School of Architecture to design buildings that can stand the test of time and can be easily converted to meet future needs.

CEE Chair and Professor Jerome Hajjar and ECE Associate Professor Taskin Padir are collaborating on a research project for post-disaster assessment of critical infrastructure such as bridges using small unmanned aircraft systems.